


you must kill what wants, like death, to keep you

by Ushio



Category: Kingdom Hearts
Genre: Character Study, M/M, Non-Explicit Sex, Unhealthy Relationships, i just finished 358 days and i had to write something or explode, underage (like lea and isa got a bit frisky at 15 so yeah)
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-06-13
Updated: 2017-06-13
Packaged: 2018-11-13 15:46:11
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,726
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11188284
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Ushio/pseuds/Ushio
Summary: "This year I have disappeared. Or I was never there. Or I was never here."At first Axel truly believes that Isa will come back.





	you must kill what wants, like death, to keep you

**Author's Note:**

  * For [gwaurens](https://archiveofourown.org/gifts?recipient=gwaurens).



> hello everybody !!!! so i just finished days and I'M FEELING SO MUCH FEELS I MIGHT EXPLODE and i decided to put this feelings into writing. i'm reeeeally interested in lea and isa's relationship as well as axel and saïx but i don't think it was the /best/ thing for either of them so this is pretty toxic all in all adkha FEAR NOT ROXAS APPEARS AT THE END TO SHINE SOME LIGHT UPON US.......
> 
> anyways this is a gift for a friend of mine i really love, gwa. she won a contest i organized like... two years ago? last year? and the main prize was a fanfic of choice. it's been long coming BUT HERE YOU GO DARLING, ENJOY IT. espero que te guste mucho y te anime con los exámenes que quedan siento que sea tan tristón es que days es así yo hice lo que pude bbb (y espero no haberla cagado que me pareció que me dijiste por aquel entonces que te gustaba lea/isa ???? I TRIED) y vaya TE MANDO UN ABRAZO ENORME /corasones
> 
> so! i really enjoyed writing this and i hope you like reading it too! let me know what you think in the comments and don't be afraid to mention typos or whatever since english is not my first language and that way i can learn more. thanks!
> 
> title is from Alex Dimitrov's “Kill Your Boyfriends," in American Boys and the first quote of the summary is from Jane Mead's "World of Made and Unmade"

At first Axel truly believes that Isa will come back. There is not much he remembers from his previous life as a human — his memories are all blurry and out-of-focus, rose-colored and soft; the growing bitterness within him yearns to shatter them. There is not much to remember but he remembers this: Isa's eyes were green. Sea foam green and he knew this even though neither of them had ever gone to the beach. But he remembers reading alongside him when they were little, clean children in clean clothes, and he remembers his warm, warm skin when their elbows touched. They sat beneath his father's desk (a shadow—) and looked at the pictures in his geography books. The sea was green and Lea said _just like your eyes_ and Isa—

Axel can't remember the last time Saïx smiled. Probably because he never has. His golden eyes follow him everywhere he goes and their weight prickles on his skin, like an itch. Axel bears it and represses the urge to gauge them out. _Patience,_ Saïx breathes on his neck, hands cold, cold and Axel bears it because he remembers how love felt.

In the beginning, when they were still young and their memories fresh, he had truly believed Isa would come back. He knows better, now.

 

* * *

 

Sometimes they pretend that nothing has changed. They call each other by their human names, and lie together on Lea's bed and kiss with the same lethargic sweetness they shared at fifteen. The walls are a rich, earthy brown and there are colorful clothes scattered all around. Lea's old toys and some of Isa's books. Clear, yellowed light spills through the windows and brings out the green in Isa's sea foam eyes. Lea's mother fusses around the house and when her footsteps are near their door they stop kissing for a second, holding their breath, and then Lea laughs against Isa's collarbone, rumbling, warm.

The memory gets weaker every passing year. To the point where they stop doing this. They stop playing pretend because they both know the truth: it is of no use. So this is what they have now: off-white walls, a clean, pristine room, a hard bed — golden eyes, cold hands at his hips and silence beyond their door. Their kissing becomes tired, listless fucking that leaves them both dissatisfied and achy. Axel cries every time, salty tears like the ice-cream he sometimes eats at the clock tower in Twilight Town, alone. He does not know why he cries. Saïx never asks.

His tears fall on Saïx's nape and he kisses him there. It is a different kiss. Sweet. Salty. Naïve.

“Stop,” says Saïx and something breaks inside of Axel.

He does as he is told, though.

He is a good dog.

(He remembers that Isa liked dogs. He wonders if that explains his unwavering sense of loyalty. He wonders what is the point in this. Why they keep pushing forwards their plans. Heart o no heart, Isa will never come back.

He wonders why he stays.)

 

* * *

 

Axel tried just once to take Saïx to the clock tower. He was silent on the trip over there and curious when Axel bought the ice-creams at the usual shop. Then they sat on the ledge, ate in an uncomfortable silence, said nothing when the fingertips in their free hands touched. Isa took off his gloves when he was finished, annoyed because his hands were sticky. Axel stared at the red sunset, warmed as he always was by the view. The colours were deep and rich — so different to the eerie, pale glow of the World that Never Was. Saïx complexion looked almost healthy in this light.

Axel played with his stick. No winner today.

“So? What is the point?” Saïx asked, scowling, and Axel felt a pang in his hollowed chest.

“There is no point to it. Just this. Enjoying the sun. The company. Don't you like being away from the castle, just for a bit...?

“Why would I? Kingdom Hearts lies there. Our great hope. It is comforting,” answered Saïx, furrowing his brow.

Axel looked away.

“For you, perhaps.”

Another long, uncomfortable silence stretched between them. Axel could feel Saïx eyes boring onto him, trying to pierce his thoughts together. The itch felt like crawling beneath his skin. He wished for it to stop and for it to never go away. He wanted to cry.

And when Saïx stood up and said _this was a waste of time, I'm going back to the castle_ , Axel heard himself speak:

“Don't you remember how we used to eat this ice-cream, together? Back at home...”

He turned around. Saïx was gone.

 

* * *

 

 

There are good moments too. Incredibly rare but there nonetheless. The memory of love that Axel still carries within him, precious, something he could never afford to lose (not like other members such as Xigbar or Xaldin have let go). There are moments when Saïx smiles, ever-so-slightly, while they lie in bed. There are moments where he opens up, however briefly, and talks to him about his worries and his thoughts and his feelings. There are kisses that remind him of Before. There is one precious, beautiful memory of Saïx laughing because Hades said something witty on a trip to the Coliseum. There are many moments of silence: but in some of them, Axel finds peace.

He takes these scraps and with them he begins to build a heart. Blackened, bitter, hollowed and ruined but a heart of his own. He does not believe that Kingdom Hearts will truly lead them to something. But these memories he holds of Isa, these memories of love — they must hold some meaning. There must be some power in them.

Sometimes Saïx looks at him and he can feel his heart beat.

 

* * *

 

 

Soon after he turns twenty-six Saïx comes to his room one night and fucks him with such a bewildered desperation that Axel comes down from it feeling dizzy and warm. Saïx's chest is heaving, fluidly moving up and down when he turns his head and looks at him. There is something bittersweet in his eyes today. Something molten and scorching hot. Axel wants to touch him, to bury his hands in him and carve him open and pry him apart until he comes loose and he can nest inside his empty rib-cage. Axel yearns.

“Are you... are you still on board with the plan? Are you still willing to go forward?” If he did not know Saïx like he does he would almost say he sounds _desperate._

His questions surprise him. Axel blinks, confused, and then smiles lazily at him.

“Of course. How could you ever doubt it?”

“You've been different. Time has changed you—“

“No,” says Axel, perhaps a bit forcefully, and Saïx shuts up at once. “We have both changed. You too... are different.”

He remembers sea foam green eyes.

“Maybe,” he admits. “But it is for the best. Everything I do I do it for our ambitions.”

“And what about Xemnas?” Axel asks because he can't help the rush of jealousy that sometimes arises in his gut.

“Fuck Xemnas,” says Saïx, flatly, and Axel barks an almost hysterical laugh. His laughter rumbles through his whole body and he feels cold and hot at once. The stickiness in his stomach is unpleasant. A beat. His blackened, tattered heart beats long and hard. As if saying _yes, yes, yes_ to the question Saïx has not yet asked.

“Axel,” says Saïx, lightly caressing his chest. His hands are long and very pale. Axel stares at his fingers. “Axel, would you kill for me? For us. For the sake of our plans.”

 _Yes, yes, yes_ beats his heart.

“Yes.”

“Even members of the organization?”

“Yes.”

And then, the miracle: Saïx smiles. Axel does not think he has seen him smile since they were twenty-four. He kisses the smile right out of his mouth and it tastes like ash.

“One day we will be real, Lea.” Saïx speaks quietly, eyes closed, head propped on his shoulder. His long hair tickles Axel and he does his best not to sneeze. “One day, this will be real.”

_It already is._

 

* * *

 

(Axel does not remember how he became a nobody. He knows it is Saïx's fault, somehow. He apologized a lot that first year.

 _I'm sorry, I'm so sorry, I'm sorry, please..._ and his words became smaller with time until they disappeared. Axel does not remember what happened but Saïx does. He recognizes the guilt in him. The regret. The fear that, one day, Axel will see this too and blame him and walk away.

All of this, Saïx guards with time and locks away to never be seen again the year they turn eighteen. Axel knows how many days have passed because he keeps a diary, like Xemnas told him to, and this keeps him sane. If you were to scroll through his thick, battered diary, you would find scrawled on the first pages _he shouldn't be afraid. I will never leave him._

The pages are wet.)

 

* * *

 

 

Saïx fears come to pass, ten years later than expected. Roxas arrives and so does Xion and Axel's blackened, bittersweet, lethargic heart blooms and rots inside his chest — leaving him empty again. Empty so he could kill at Castle Oblivion and still sleep. Empty so he could lie to Roxas's young, innocent face and still breathe. Empty, so empty that it is the perfect soil for something new to grow.

He eats ice-creams with Roxas and, eventually, Xion. Something warm and light crystallizes in his chest. Something beautiful, fragrant, pure. Like the yellowed light spilling through his window back at home on summer days. Like his mother's humming and the rhythm of the Evensong, languid and comfortable when they would go to church. Sea foam green eyes turn blue and when he looks at Roxas his heart beats and it is _true_.

 

* * *

 

“Let's go the beach,” he says to Roxas and Xion. The sea must be blue, he thinks, blue like their eyes, and those old books he used to browse were probably wrong. Legs dangling off the tower's edge, with Roxas laughter ringing in his ears and Xion's sweet voice soothing him, he lets his ice-cream stick fall to the abyss. A winner stick.

 _Goodbye, Isa_.

 

* * *

 

Perhaps it is time to grow up and own up to some mistakes.

 

 


End file.
